Meeting Notes 2026 01 27

These are the notes from the The 850th Meeting of Noisebridge.

Date	2026 01 27
Note-taker[s]	Julius, Loren wiki
Moderator[s]	Jet

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Meeting Summary

2026-01-27 #850

• Announcements
  • Limbolandia: temporary junk zone behind seating; triage now, clear Saturday, formal return later.
  • New CNC: Carvera Air; arrival after Wednesday.
  • Eric McCain memorial: Sat 2026-03-14, 12–2; Main Chapel, Italian Cemetery (Colma); longtime Noisebridger.
  • Zoning / permitting: 2023 change-of-use violation; contractor + city checks signed; ~$7k; closeout pending; request to digitize + wiki.
  • Anti-harassment / excellence: ask-to-leave policy reiterated; report via safespace + Discord.
  • Guilds/WGs: website/infra bottleneck; call for more maintainers; links shared.
  • Fundraising: grant application in progress; target ~$50k.

• Finances
  • Spending: permitting + contractor (~$7k); covered.
  • Reference: latest reports on wiki.

• Membership
  • new AccessM / CoreM categories reiterated.
  • Trevor - Access Member; sponsor Naomi; no objections.
  • Zoellen - Access Member; sponsor Naomi; no objections.
  • Julius - Core Member; eligibility affirmed; no blocks.
  • Jet - Core Member; sponsors Loren + Elan; no blocks.

• Consensus Items
  • None.

• Discussion
  • Music Room — Naomi/others seek decision: lock types; future combo lock; coziness vs risk; couches as privacy/safety intensifier; materials/cleanliness; gender balance; norms vs furniture; outcome: no approval to acquire/install couches.
  • Wiki availability / Cloudflare — Jet seeks outcome: outages, scraping/DDOS; Cloudflare vs self-mitigations; DNS control constraints; static fallback suggestion; invite collaboration.
  • Bank → Credit Union? — Elan seeks temperature check: dissatisfaction with Wells Fargo; CU experiences (SF FCU cited); $100 opening cost; informal support offered.
  • Limbolandia reorg — Julius seeks coordination: rotate room; move toxic/vented tools toward roll-up door; stage orientation; shelving; Flaschen Taschen placement + maintenance; Gamebridge impacts; solicit feedback before changes.
  • Sponsorship paperwork found — JD seeks coordination: confirmation; process cleanup.
  • Donation QR codes — Daniel seeks demo/feedback: 3D-printed QR donation links; positive reception.
  • Killer Queen cabinet — Felix seeks coordination: footprint + schedule; tourneys ~weekly; streaming constraints; potential cabinet swaps for space; flexible timeline; continue exploration.

Meeting Summary

• Fundraising Update
  • Naomi is working on a grant application for approximately $50k.

• Announcements
  • Limbolandia (downstairs junk pile): Items placed behind the meeting area will be removed; everything currently in Limbolandia is planned to be gone by Saturday.
  • New CNC machine: Carvera Air CNC arriving sometime after Wednesday.
  • Eric McCain Memorial Service: Long-time Noisebridger. Saturday March 14, 12–2pm, Main Chapel, Italian Cemetery, 540 F Street, Colma.

• Finances
  • Two checks signed (contractor + City of SF) totaling ~$7k, resolving the 2023 change-of-use violation. (And we're done reporting updates at the meeting: concludes year of front door, electrical, woodshop construction, & permitting "bureaucracy" updates.
  • Once delivered, zoning/permitting violation expected to be closed.
  • Request made to digitize and upload permitting documents to the wiki.

• New Members / Membership Changes
  • Trevor sponsored for Access Member (Sponsor: Naomi). No objections.
  • Zoellen sponsored for Access Member (Sponsor: Naomi). No objections.
  • Julius advanced to Core Member; no blocks raised.
  • Jet advanced to Core Member (moderated by Elan); no blocks raised.
  • Membership categories reiterated:
    • Supporting Member – donor
    • Access Member – can open/close space
    • Core Member – can nominate members and block Big-C consensus

• Consensus Items
  • No Big-C consensus items proposed or resolved.

• Discussion Items
  • Music Room
    • Ongoing discussion around privacy, locks, furniture (couches vs chairs), cleanliness, gender balance, and safety.
    • Concerns raised about locked/cozy rooms as intensifiers for problematic behavior.
    • Preference expressed for non-porous seating and reduced privacy.
    • Music Room couches: No consensus reached approving acquisition or installation of couches in the Music Room.
    • Comfy armchairs are fine. Something likely to promote sleep: not.
  • Wiki uptime / Cloudflare
    • Proposal to use Cloudflare for DDoS protection due to scraping via Hurricane Electric.
    • Counterpoints raised: architectural mitigations, static fallback, DNS control complexity.
    • No decision reached.
  • Bank → Credit Union
    • General interest in switching away from Wells Fargo.
    • SF Federal Credit Union discussed.
    • Group comfortable spending $100 to open an account; informal offers to spot funds.
  • Limbolandia / Downstairs reconfiguration
    • Plan to rotate room orientation and move toxic-fume equipment closer to roll-up door.
    • Potential impacts to Gamebridge and electronics area noted; feedback to be solicited.
  • Membership paperwork
    • Sponsorship paperwork located and processed for Trevor and Zoellen.
  • Donation QR Codes
    • Daniel demoed 3D-printed QR codes linking to donation page; positive reception.
  • Killer Queen Arcade Cabinet
    • Proposal to host 5v5 competitive cabinet (Felix / Toonces on Discord).
    • Footprint, streaming, scheduling, and frequency discussed.
    • No decision reached.

Introductions

• Elan - Spacebridge/Wiki*/Kubernetes

• Julius - I do things that fly - that means balloons drones, maybe rockets at some point.

• Josh - I hack on things

• Zacchae - recently set up the matrix server and am finding out that people are having trouble logging in

• Lauren - New. Came here to build a table. Thought it was cool, so I'm staying

• Zoren - Finally put up a Zulip server which I am excited about. Shared links in the infra meeting notes.

• JD - I teach the laser class, have been dealing with the permitting and complaints from the city. We will talk about that later

• Felix - I joined because you guys might Killer Queen Cabinet.

• Rob - I have connected Felix and LX and talked about bringing in the cabinet

• Garret (goes by G) - What I do maker wise is things that make noise. Historically sythesizers and stuff, but speakers now. Front end software engineer.

• Jet - they/them - Been a noisebridger for a while. I like to make THINGS. I also run the social media for the space.

• Zoe - aka the person who did the murals upstairs next to the music room, aka the person who will probably be infiltrating the music room in the next months.

• Trevor - Been coming here just less than six months or something like that. I'm into a few things. Right now mostly holographic technology and music. Just bought an electric guitar so I'll be playing that in the next few months.

• Dana - friends with Josh, just sitting in and seeing what you're up to.

Excellence

Our One Rule is to Be Excellent to Each Other.

What does that mean? Please see our page on Excellence !

Julius: It's excellent to help take notes Zoellen: It's excellent to stay on topic in the meeting Jet...give us a broad definition of excellence dammit JD: Since we have a disparete group of people who jsut come in off the street, and we don't have any employees etc who can tell you "HEY LOOK OUT", we _all_ have to take responsiblity for the space. Jet: Excellence keeps us from not-molatov cocktailing our cocktails

Annoucements

We have a pile of junk behind us, we're calling it limbolandia. Toss stuff there you want us to toss further

New CNC machine - Carvera Air. It will be here some time after Wednesday

Eric McCain Memorial Service - long time noisebridger. His memorial will be on March 14th 12-2 in the main chapel, Italian Cemetary (540 F Street, Colma). Please feel free to come.

Anti-Harassment Policy & Community Standards of Excellence

Noisebridge has an Anti-Harassment Policy!

Everyone is expected to follow the Anti-Harassment Policy, please familiarize yourself with it.)

For approachable & specific guidelines see: Community Standards

Jet: Beyond excellence, we need to make sure there isn't continuously bad behavior. We have an organizational way of dealing with bad behavior. One of those things is our ask to leave policy. Noisebridge has a policy you can ask anyone at any time to leave. Backup anyone who asks someone else to leave.

If you see anything that is sus, or weird, or wrong, or think might be an issue in the future, say something to people on Di³scord so we can do something about it.

Please note: https://safespace.noisebridge.net/ is one way to quickly raise issues which will be seen by people in Discord.

Brief Kudos

All the people who helped kickstart the reorg of the downstairs (Julius, Elan, Jet, Blue, etc.)

Zoning, Permitting, & Improvements -- Standing Item

Two checks have been signed - one for our contractor, and one for the city, for our violation having to do with our change-of-use that was issued in 2023. Once that is delivered, this will be closed. I would like someone to help digitize the documents and put them on the wiki.

Guilds & WGs

Reports from guilds & working groups. Updates! Events! Requests!

Elan - There has been a bottleneck of folks who are able to handle the website issues. We want to expand that group. Be brave! Be bold! Be excellent!

New Members/Associate Members

Julius is close to becoming a steward (or whatever we're calling it) member.

Zoellen had access in the past and may like access again

Trevor would like to become an access member - I want to be like an indie James Cameron. Naomi

Jet would like to be a core member - Loren joins Elan as co-sponsors

Reiterating: the new names for categories of membership:

Supporting Member - you donate to keep the space alive

Access Member - you can open and close the space

Core Member - You can nominate Access and Core members, and block Big C consensus items.

Financial Report (first Tuesday of month only)

Anarchist societies under a capitalist state need money to survive and thrive, yo.

• Monthly revenue, expenses. Big projects. Big fundraising events. Reserves in bank.
• Any other details by those participating in handling our financials
• The latest financial reports from the treasurer are available at https://noisebridge.net/wiki/Finances

Spending Needs

Covered in permitting update - about 7k total going out.

Fundraising Update

Naomi is working on a grant application for potentially 50k.

Discussion Items

Template... [num]: [topic-short]

On topic:	<PUT_TOPIC_NAME_HERE>
From/Raised by:	<PUT_NOISEBRIDGER_ALIAS_HERE>
Seeking:	decision/outcome/advice/[?]

1: Music Room

On topic:	Music Room
From/Raised by:	<PUT_N-OISEBRIDGER_ALIAS_HERE>
Seeking:	decision/outcome/advice/[?]

Naomi: now there is a lock on the door. Same as the 3d print room.

JD: There are two keys in play. The perimeter key, and the interior key.

Naomi: the intention is to have a combo lock on the music room like the sewing room. There is also an intention to make it cozy, which is controversial.

Loren: The last picture I posted in bravespace was two people laying on a couch in the music room. This was the precipitating event for two people being 86ed, and then two more weeks later. A room where the door closes and locks is an intenifying factor.

Zoellen: Couches are good for fingering instruments, not people. Chairs may make more sense in an enclosed room.

Zacchae: we do have couches over here, but those don't seem to be a problem.

Julius: Cloth is hard to keep clean, wood or non-porous surfaces are easier to clean up. An issue is how private the room is, we don't have these issues with the downstairs couches.

JD: ,the couches, sofas, we had at the lounge at the top of the stairs had issues too...can encourage to informal of a setting where people are not necessarily hacking as hard as they should be and it can become a frat house which will hurt our gender diversity too. The reason the one at the top of the stairs was closed was because it was on the path to the sewing room which is like our one semi-safespace for women.

Naomi: We tend to find technological solutions to social problems. I have a robot parrot. Which is really annoying. I can set it up to trigger every half hour unless you are a music guild member and have the disarm code. The other part I want to say and I'm not sure how deep I want to get into it but the gender imbalance thing is something I want to bring up, I think it is partly caused by the space not being comfortable.

Julius: I feel making the space comfortable is complicated. I feel social norms in the space are more powerful than physical attributes in the space as far as influencing gender balance

Elan: echoing the concern about the vibes issue. Also, when I joined, there was a major issue with bedbugs upstairs.

Trevor: Not super strong opinion on couches specifically, but somewhere to sit with a guitar that's not an office chair that blocks the guitar. I hear what people are saying about the potential to make bad decisions, but we have the power to talk to people and give them warnings if necessary. I don't think we need to run away from coziness because there have been bad actors in the past.

Solderfumes: The couches are a honeypot, serve a good use. That was half joking but half true. If you go to the commons, they have a bunch of cozy space and cozy lighting. They don't have any issues. There are way more women in the space. The other thing is that if people are sleeping, you an 86 them. If they're doing shady stuff in the space but not stepping over the line, that can be kind of difficult to address.

Julius: Weirdly most of our 86's are for sleeping, it seems to be a strong filter

Loren: other place in Oakland is not open to the public, it's membership based so that probably helps with the difference we're seeing with the sleeping and gender imbalance issues we have vs. them.

note: consensus was not reached approving acquisition and installation of couches in the music room --- jd

2: Cloudflare

On topic:	wiki down cloudflare
From/Raised by:	<PUT_NOISEBRIDGER_ALIAS_HERE>
Seeking:	decision/outcome/advice/[?]

Jet: Outcome I seek is the wiki being up...all the time. I'm gonna make this one short and antagonzing so I get more discussion. The wiki is a *core* part of how people discover the space, understand what's going on, and document the space. It's a bad look (for a technical space) if people are finding that the info is not available.

Jet: Hurricane Electric - we're getting scraped. Cloudflare DDOS protection could be used, but it is not. I am proposing that we start using cloudflare.

Daniel: we should have a static fallback. If we're self-hosting, it's a bit sad if we need to use that service.

Josh: It's an architecture issue. There are a lot of ways we could mitigate that on our end.

Jet: When we started trying to address this, we ran into issues with two people who control the DNS situation.

Loren: Hurricane Electric is a tier 2 provider. They do colocation. We have a relationship with iocoop that rents a rack. We are getting a VPS from them, which is a standard product. I would like to invite you into working on this. I don't think that addressing this as an impassioned political speech is the most effective way.

3: Switch Bank to Credit Union?

On topic:	Bank->Credit Union?
From/Raised by:	Elan
Seeking:	gauging general interest

Elan: I don't love Wells Fargo. Don't want to speak for the treasurer, but I have heard about pain points/experienced things through Loren. Seems like things that don't happen with my bank, but I have also heard great things about credit unions.

Zacchae: My two cents; I went through the personal experience of fuck banks, get a credit union, it was great and it's way better.

JD: I've been a member of the SF federal credit union for a long time and you get all kinds of good things, no excessive charges. It ain't what it used to be but it's still pretty good. They're at 770 Golden Gate Avenue at Gough. You need a $100 to keep an account open.

Elan: Would it be ok to spend $100 to open an account?

several: yes, I'll spot you $100

(discussion item) 4: [topic]

On topic:	The Revenge of Limbolandia
From/Raised by:	Julius
Seeking:	decision/outcome/advice/[?]

Julius: Just want to get people up to speed on this. I've been agitating on this for months, planning on rotating room 90 degrees. Stage 2 might affect other things, tentatively I want to move the lasers and other things that vent toxic fumes to be closer to the rollup door. That would affect gamebridge so before I do that I will solicit feedback. Anyhow right now, everything in Libolandia will be gone Saturday, Then I want to bring back limbolandia in a more formal repeating manner. JD: Put the stage so people walking in are facing the audience. Naomi: Adjacent to this is creating some heavy duty shelving. Also if you put the flaschen taschen behind people they won't be able to take pictures of the people presenting. Julius: We'll need to do some maintenance on the flaschen taschen, and then permanently attach it to the wall. I'ld like to make a straight shot from front to back. That's another reason the laser needs to move. Elan: Wherever the 'taschen ends up it should be up against the wall. JD: Are we giving up on it being able to go on the road Jet: It isn't maintained enough to go on the road. Miloh: I helped build it, it is probably better to keep it in one piece rather than trying to move it and reassemble it. Trevor: I like the idea of taking toxic stuff up by the front rollup door. JD: Do we want to get rid of the downstairs electonics area Julius: Kinda interwoven, unsure what I want to do. Jet: I've never seen anyone use the downstairs electronics area.

Template... [5]: [topic-short]

On topic:	We found the paperwork to sponsor the two members
From/Raised by:	JD
Seeking:	decision/outcome/advice/[?]

Trevor: I mostly use the space to work on my own projects on my laptop. The main thing I'm interested in is holographic tech, interested in VR, want to be indie James Cameron.

Sponsors: Naomi,

Jet: Would anyone like to object? (no)

Elan: Trevor...what sorts of things will you be working on now that you have more access? Trevor: I think I'll work on making the space more cozy, clean, and logical. I've just bought some music gear and will be messing around in the music room Jet: I believe if Trevor comes by things here will get better.

Zoellen:

   Hi, don't spell my name with a "y". I'm into music. I apparently like emo-rave. Sometimes I paint murals
   (many people agree they're awesome)

Maybe Trevor and I can switch off on the music room, while you're doing music I can do art.

Jet: Has anyone sponsored Zoeellen? Naomi: I have

Jet: Does anyone want to ask Zoeellen any questions? Jet: Will you be doing any raves? Zoellen: I will.

Jet: Anyonoe want to block? <silence>

Julius: Core membership, definitely more than 4 weeks now. Just entering into the record this is definitely well into my 4th meeting where people can block me?

Jet: What are we supposed to do at this point? Others: Decide if we want to block him Jet: Does anyone want to? Others: No

Jet: I'd like to be a core member It's been my 4th time too. Elan, could you moderate for me becoming a core member? Elan: Yes Elan: Jet, could you introduce yourself? Jet: Hi, I'm Jet, I was a moderator about 10 seconds ago, a Noisebridger about 9 months ago. I like messing with robots and programming. I have made a lot of great friends at Noisebridge. I'm trying to help bring Noisebridge back. Elan: Does anyone have any questions? JD: What does being a core member mean to you? Jet: that's a good question. I feel Noisebridge is currently going through a bunch of important changes. Being here to help defend the ideas of Noisebridge is important to me. I also just want to be a core member to help Noisebridge. Elan: Any other questions? Loren: We sometimes say that blocks are to be used as a last measure. At some point in our history we've said if you're willing to block something that it should be something imoportant enough to you to leave the 'bridge for. For you what would those be? Jet: I might block if a bad person were trying to become a member. I can't really think of too many distinct examples. I would dig my heals into the ground against moving the space. Do YOU have any examples? Elan: Anyone have anything else to say? Before we ask them to go 'organize the electronics room', can you guys say a little more? Julius: I first came to Noisebridge in 2013. Nowadays I mostly do Spacebridge, we may have a launch this weekend. I'm trying to get more making going on in the space, bringing in a CNC, setting up a drone racetrack on the ceiling. Elan: Any questions? Daniel: I thought you were a core member a long time ago Julius: I kinda now need to become a core member because people keep asking me to sponsor them. Elan: cool, any other questions? Loren: What does wtf stand for in nb.wtf?

Elan: Now you guys go upstairs and walk around the space to see if its on fire. Elan, does anyone have any concerns while they are out of the room? Anyone block? <no> Elan: I am very excited for more core people become core members so they can deal with Noisebridge crap more.

Template... [num]: [topic-short]

Daniel: I am 3D printing QR codes for donations. They take you to a donation page which works really well (proceeds to run a demo). <lots of clapping>

Template... [num]: [topic-short]

On topic:	Killer queen cabinet
From/Raised by:	James
Seeking:	decision/outcome/advice/[?]

Felix: 5v5 arcade game. It is a competitive activity. Originally at the detour. Also at Emporium. A competitive community has formed around this game. One of the ways the guys have been playing has been in a private spaces. Community has a lot of the same values as Noisebridge. We're looking for a new home because I am housing gaming refugees and am running out of space. Elan: What's the footprint? Felix: It's a double-sided console, it's pretty big, room for 5 people. Jet: We've got two arcade cabinets which could go and then we'd have room Felix: It streams Jet: We're ok with streaming as long as it isn't getting the general public unexpectedly. Felix: There's no sound recording. Julius: How often do people want to use it? Felix: During tourney season about once a week, 15-20 people. Julius: How flexible are you with scheduling? Felix: We're fairly flexible Jet: What's your timeline? Felix: It's sitting in my garage. Felix: Toonces on discord

...Copy/Paste more discussion items as needed...

Do-ocratic Task Board

Participation also means doing stuff to contribute to the space. Propose new tasks or pick some tasks from Github, from what needs to be done around you, or whatever, and see if someone will sign up to work on that task. Anyone can sign up and it's a great way to show you are contributing!

• What wiki pages need updating? What new wiki pages do we need? Discovered from the meeting.